THREE GIRLS
Standing stranded at a car service station
waiting because of a punctured tyre, I watched
three young girls
loiter into the open service station
like clueless rustic women
trying to look abreast of the urban style,
wearing a mask of nonchalance,
they ambled timorously into the parking lot
and stationed themselves for some suspicious, clandestine rendezvous.
They were not the callous type with deadened nerves, with aggressive animosity
to the world of men swaggering around.
Not unduly perturbed by the conflicting voices of morality and the need of the life they had chosen to live
they were waiting for the client who had paid for the night.
There was neither fear nor expectancy,
no vile puerile curiosity.
They were restless because they had to guard themselves
against the rabid smiles and the insinuating gestures of the passers-by.
One of them had a coy demure face of a bride,
and a matronly wise look of a woman who knew
what love was all about.
The other two shifted their weight
from one leg to the other
and then one of them impatiently surged forward to see if the client's car arrived.
In the meantime, girls of their age walked past in haste
talking and gesticulating on their smartphones
wildly, eloquently, arguing fiercely with all the passion they knew
over how they were right and the other wrong,
oblivious of what was going around.
The three girls stood like magi
waiting outside the cottage on a wintry night,
two of them wringing their hands in a cold dismay
and the wise one smiling knowledgeably,
maintaining a wonderful equanimity.
For a few seconds
the streaming traffic blocked my view
and when the sight was cleared they had already disappeared into a red car that turned around and went past me.
I missed the chance to see how they went, with what kind of a feeling toward their fate, like prisoners taken to the noose, or slaves walking to the galley, or with an indifferent gratitude.
Three young girls on the brink of life!
Sushama Karnik
Apr 20, 2016.
Standing stranded at a car service station
waiting because of a punctured tyre, I watched
three young girls
loiter into the open service station
like clueless rustic women
trying to look abreast of the urban style,
wearing a mask of nonchalance,
they ambled timorously into the parking lot
and stationed themselves for some suspicious, clandestine rendezvous.
They were not the callous type with deadened nerves, with aggressive animosity
to the world of men swaggering around.
Not unduly perturbed by the conflicting voices of morality and the need of the life they had chosen to live
they were waiting for the client who had paid for the night.
There was neither fear nor expectancy,
no vile puerile curiosity.
They were restless because they had to guard themselves
against the rabid smiles and the insinuating gestures of the passers-by.
One of them had a coy demure face of a bride,
and a matronly wise look of a woman who knew
what love was all about.
The other two shifted their weight
from one leg to the other
and then one of them impatiently surged forward to see if the client's car arrived.
In the meantime, girls of their age walked past in haste
talking and gesticulating on their smartphones
wildly, eloquently, arguing fiercely with all the passion they knew
over how they were right and the other wrong,
oblivious of what was going around.
The three girls stood like magi
waiting outside the cottage on a wintry night,
two of them wringing their hands in a cold dismay
and the wise one smiling knowledgeably,
maintaining a wonderful equanimity.
For a few seconds
the streaming traffic blocked my view
and when the sight was cleared they had already disappeared into a red car that turned around and went past me.
I missed the chance to see how they went, with what kind of a feeling toward their fate, like prisoners taken to the noose, or slaves walking to the galley, or with an indifferent gratitude.
Three young girls on the brink of life!
Sushama Karnik
Apr 20, 2016.
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